Chapter 565: Chapter 539: Are You Interested in Digging Up Some More People?
âAre you listening to me?â Wu Di suddenly asked.
âHuh?â Lincoln was stunned for a moment, âOf course! Iâve been listening.â
âSo what did I say?â Wu Diâs eyes were full of suspicion.
âYou said⊠um, you said the pace was too slow, and it takes a month just to complete the entry-level tasks in Assassinâs Way. Players who lack patience might get agitated. Also, the world is too peaceful, so thereâs no place to use the strength you acquire. Transportation is not convenient either, and you have to run everywhere by yourselfâŠâ Lincoln repeated what he heard from Mavisâs voice in his ear.
Wu Di was a bit surprised but didnât say much, nodding and continuing, âYes, those things I can understand since the game is not yet complete. But isnât the quest line way off? Iâve spent seven days and havenât even completed a third of the progress.â
âDonât worry, donât worry,â Lincoln reassured, âThis quest line and ability improvement curve were just made by a few staff members when they had free time, itâs a little more complicated because they took lots of real-life martial arts expertsâ opinions into account. When the game is officially released, these will definitely be significantly modified.â
âWhen will the game be released?â Wu Di asked with great anticipation.
âWell⊠uhâŠâ Lincoln was a bit tongue-tied, âI can only say itâs coming soon, very soonâŠâ
Without waiting for Wu Di to ask further questions, Lincoln immediately changed the subject: âAs for transportation issues, there will definitely be improvements when the time comes. I have a suggestion for you: after the release of Battlefield, you can try cavalry and practice horse riding.â
âBattlefield?â Wu Di immediately asked the same question again, âWhen will Battlefield be released?â
Lincoln paused for a few seconds, ââŠsoon, very soon.â
Wu Di was speechless: âAnyways, everything is coming soon, right?â
However, he also knew that the release date of a game was indeed a big deal, and it was normal not to talk about it casually.
So he changed the subject and continued talking about his gaming experience for the past week.
They chatted for a full half-hour, discussing everything they could think of before Wu Di logged off and left.
In another hour, he had to lead a group of aunties to do their exercise routine, so he needed to get ready in advance.
*
Lincoln, on the other hand, took note of the things he had discussed with Wu Di.
He entered some of the information into his agenda, then forwarded the relevant parts to the Virtual Changâan team.
After that, he returned to the small sofa on the Spaceship to find Mavis.
At this time, Mavis was curled up on the sofa, with dozens of screens of various sizes in front of her, clearly still intensely following the gossip.
When she saw Lincoln come in, the screens slowed down, allowing him to see them clearly as well.
Lincoln sat down and looked at the screensâ
[NetDragon headquarters and R&D center sealed off! Massive SWAT deployment on-site, suspected of involving serious criminal offenses!]
[The dust settles! Lincolnâs grudges with NetDragon finally coming to an end today?!]
[Breaking news! NetDragon boss Richard sent to jail, once the leading game company, finally reaching a dead end?!]
âŠ
Under each report, numerous netizens were enjoying the drama and gossiping.
Scenes of NetDragonâs headquarters surrounded by SWAT and police tape, videos of Richard being escorted out of the company, expressions of panic on numerous NetDragon employees as they left the companyâthese on-site records were everywhere.
Especially the photo of Richard looking pale and desolate like a beaten dog, which had already made its way to the second spot on the Hot Searches list.
Why wasnât it the top Hot Search?
Itâs because the top Hot Search was even more outrageous!
It was a picture of Lincoln sitting in the co-driverâs seat of the box truck with a hat on, leaning out of the window to glance at NetDragonâs headquarters.
Initially, this was to give Mavis a clearer view of the drama, but when more people gathered, especially when reporters appeared, Lincoln had honestly retreated back into the car.
They still managed to take a photo, though.
However, he was mentally prepared for this and wasnât surprised.
What truly surprised him was the outrageous title attached to this pictureâ
[The Number One Grudge Holder in the Modern-Day Internet!]
Shockingly, the comment section highly approved of this absurd titleâ freewebnĂžvel.coɱ
â[Steals from his enemies at their weakest moments!]â
â[Merciful heart, lightning-fast moves!]â
âEver since Lincoln debuted on the Internet, weâve never seen him suffer any losses! Apologizing, paying compensation, going to jail, his opponents never end well! I was wondering why NetDragon kept going without admitting their mistakes, and how it would all end. Turns out theyâre getting raided! Awesome! Lincoln never disappoints me!â
âThe No.1 ruthless man on the internet today! Refreshing!â
âSuch satisfying revenge! A role model for our generation!â
âŠ
Due to Cloud Dreamâs consistently high reputation and the massive user base, its advantage in the Internet public opinion warfare is simply enormous.
After browsing through a bunch of netizen comments, Lincoln only saw a few people criticizing him, saying things like âtoo extreme,â âan apology would have sufficed, but you had to send someone to jail,â and âbeing so ruthless, you must not be a good person, and your charity work is probably all for show.â
However, these comments were immediately drowned out by dozens or even hundreds of times more comments from other netizens.
The current hot topic of discussion has shifted to âWill Lincoln buy NetDragon?â
Seeing this, Lincoln couldnât help but shake his head. He had no interest in NetDragon, so why would he buy an already outdated company?
Only if he was crazy would he buy NetDragon.
However⊠he could consider acquiring the IP rights of the âBlazeâ series.
When the time comes and he has some free time, he can have Randall, Fred, and the original Flaming Project Team staff to work on âBlaze 4â together.
This would be the true âBlazeâ sequel, made by the original team for a genuine experience!
However, as the most famous and valuable IP, NetDragon might not be willing to sell it off easily.
They would probably wait until they really canât hold on any longer, and the company is about to go bankrupt, before theyâd be willing to sell.
âLetâs just wait a bit longer.â
Lincoln wasnât in a hurry, because he felt that after this hit, the day that NetDragon goes bankrupt is likely not far off.
As for the massive number of netizens that went to his comment section, frantically mentioning him and hoping for him to say somethingâŠ
Lincoln planned to pretend not to notice.
Although he was happy to see NetDragon suffer, there was no need to be aggressive on the internet since he was already satisfied.
Moreover, he had more important things to do â the release of the early access version of âBattlefieldâ.
Although he told Wu Di that the time for both âChangâanâ and âBattlefieldâ was âalmost there,â the meaning of âalmostâ was entirely different for each case!
For âChangâan,â itâs the âalmost thereâ of creating a new folder, while for âBattlefield,â itâs genuinely almost ready for release!
To be more precise: itâs this coming Friday, the day after tomorrow!
Once again, it follows Cloud Dreamâs tradition of âtesting or releasing trailers and selling one week laterâ.
However, to cater to the sales of âMy World,â they didnât announce the release date earlier.
After delaying for two consecutive weeks, the deficiencies in the single-player campaign have been fully compensated, and even the armory of various military types has been expanded to some extent.
In their spare time, the development team members have already conducted several trial runs â the âBattlefieldâ development team is currently the largest team in Cloud Dream, capable of easily assembling teams of 30v30, 60v60, or even 100v100.
These âinternal testsâ have indeed helped them discover some minor issues.
However, being developers themselves, they often have a limited perspective, so their testing canât replace actual player testing.
Especially large-scale, long-term, and diverse tactical player testing â itâs impossible to replace.
Itâs important to note that the gameplays imagined by developers and the actual gameplays players choose arenât always the same, sometimes even running completely against each other.
*
When the lunch break was over, Lincoln logged into the virtual office and found Samuel.
He needed Samuel to evaluate whether announcing the âBattlefieldâ early access version on Thursday would be affected by the NetDragon incident.
If it was only domestic sales, Lincoln was fully confident that it wouldnât matter at all.
However, NetDragon had a relatively comprehensive international sales channel, meaning that they also had a certain player base overseas.
On the other hand, Cloud Dream has only just started its venture into several European countries two or three weeks ago; they might not have established as large a player base as NetDragon in those regions.
Just now, when he was on the small sofa, he noticed some character content other than Chinese characters among Mavisâ posts â apparently, the impact of this incident has quickly spread overseas.
The grudges between Cloud Dream and NetDragon will undoubtedly be unearthed and reported.
In this situation, releasing a new game, especially an âunfinishedâ one, might be unpredictable in its effects.
Worst case scenario, if players overseas think that heâs doing this to âstep on rivals,â opting to release the game at this time regardless of player experience and game completeness, it would be terrible.
ââSales being affected is a small matter, but Cloud Dreamâs reputation being affected is a big deal!
Therefore, he needed Samuel to evaluate the situation beforehand.
If there really were negative effects, they could consider releasing the âBattlefieldâ early access version only in Chinese-speaking areas first, and delaying the release in other regions for another week.
After clearly explaining everything to Samuel, Lincoln finally went to the âBattlefieldâ development world.
However, before he could check the development logs from the past two days, Fred suddenly came over and asked, âBoss, are you interested in poaching some talent from NetDragon?â